About Canada’s Global Innovation Clusters

On this page

• What is a cluster
• The Cluster impact across the ecosystem
• Made-in-Canada approach to innovation
• Future proofing with Canadian-made intellectual property
• History of the program

What is a cluster

Clusters are areas of intense business activity made up of companies, academic institutions and not-for-profit organizations that boost innovation and growth in a particular industry. Clusters are powerful economic tools used globally to build, grow, and transform industries. While there are many different types of clusters around the world, the Global Innovation Clusters program uses a unique business model that allows clusters to move at the speed of business, and leverage government investments to accelerate innovation and economic growth for Canada.

Funding flows into Canada's Global Innovation Clusters through co-investment by government and industry, with a requirement of dollar-for-dollar matching. So far, industry investment has surpassed this expectation. To learn more on how the clusters are achieving their targets, visit the Global Innovation Clusters by the numbers page.

The clusters make strategic investments, de-risk innovation and help realize projects that would not otherwise be possible. The program is also setting the stage for self-sustaining ecosystems and driving economic growth by boosting investor confidence, leveraging commercial opportunities, and attracting follow-on investments from a variety of industry and government sources.

Each cluster is unique. But they are usually made up of:

• large and small companies
• researchers and academics
• not-for-profit organizations
• accelerators and incubators

The Cluster impact across the ecosystem

Clusters encourage industry leaders, small and medium-sized companies and post-secondary institutions to collaborate on large-scale projects, in order to accelerate growth in some of Canada's most promising industries:

• Digital technologies
• Plant proteins
• Advanced manufacturing
• Artificial intelligence (AI) in supply chains
• Oceans

As these industries grow, their ecosystems strengthen, boosting Canada's economy by creating jobs and attracting investments and talent to Canada.

Clusters help by:

Fostering collaboration across the ecosystem and beyond

• The clusters connect hundreds of partners and collaborators to solve industry-level challenges from coast to coast to coast.
• Through connections facilitated by the Digital Technology Cluster, companies are able to scale products and services faster and achieve outcomes that could not be achieved by any one partner.
• The program has been integral in helping innovators drive breakthroughs in their respective industries and scale quickly. Ideon Technologies' Discovery Platform provides an example of this. Read more about the Ideon Technologies' project.

Supporting company growth and attracting talent, research, and capital

• The clusters are helping to establish Canada as a world-leader in Canada's most promising industries.
• More than 450 start-ups and small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) have been created, supported, or scaled up as a result of cluster activities.

Supporting the commercialization of innovation in the global marketplace with new products, processes and services

• The clusters' focus on intellectual property (IP) is helping Canadian companies generate revenue while protecting their ideas and entering new global markets.
• The Ocean Cluster is providing ecosystem members, particularly SMEs, with expert IP guidance that has helped companies like Graphite Innovation and Technologies (GIT), to build a patent portfolio, develop cutting-edge products and meet customers' needs in several foreign markets. Read more about GIT's success.

Empowering Canadian SMEs

• The clusters provide SMEs with access to networks, resources, expertise, and mentorship to support scale-up and growth, foster competitiveness, help firms expand into global markets, overcome the barriers of technology adoption, as well as access and commercialize their IP.
• It is a requirement to involve at least one SME in every cluster project.
• The Protein Industries Cluster is helping SMEs in the plant-based food, feed and ingredient ecosystem across Canada uncover new technologies and put them in use. Crush Dynamics is one of the companies that has been able to expand and deepen its knowledge with the support of the cluster program. Read more about Crush Dynamics.

Building a skilled and diverse workforce

• The clusters are creating opportunities for women, racialized Canadians, Indigenous communities and other under-represented groups and fostering inclusive economic growth, including through workshops, formalized training, and internship opportunities for equity-deserving groups.
• The clusters are committed to gender parity within their boards of directors.
• The Advanced Manufacturing Cluster for example is transforming Canada’s manufacturing sector into a world-leading ecosystem by working with members to build programs, like the Transformation Leadership Program, which helps organizational leaders better understand their workforce needs. Read more about the Advanced Manufacturing Cluster success.

7,000 
workforce and skilling development placements have been funded through the Digital Technology Cluster

50%
of Protein Industries Cluster projects complete an Indigenous economic reconciliation activity within the project

488,700 
participants have benefited from the Advanced Manufacturing Cluster’s talent attraction or placement activities

25,700 
youth participants are learning in-demand skills through the Scale AI Cluster’s STEM outreach program

3,000 
individuals have benefited from skills development training and programs through Ocean Cluster projects and initiatives

Made-in-Canada approach to innovation

The Global Innovation Clusters program is led by Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED); however, each cluster is an independent, not-for-profit entity with its own industry-led board of directors, responsible for:

• managing operations and activities;
• outlining strategic priorities; and,
• ensuring a fair, consistent, and independent project selection process.

ISED announced its investment in Canada's five clusters through five non-repayable contributions:

Future proofing with Canadian-made intellectual property

To address some of the complexity and challenges around IP and to maximize the impact for Canadian businesses, entrepreneurs and innovators, the Global Innovation Clusters program has made IP a key program consideration.

Clusters fund ground-breaking collaborative projects that are transforming bold ideas into promising Canadian-made solutions that address some of the world’s most pressing challenges.

As project partners work on transforming their ideas into tangible solutions, clusters play a key role in providing valuable guidance and educational opportunities that help their members and Canadian SMEs protect these ideas, commercialize them and leverage IP to their advantage.

The clusters are helping to protect Canadian IP interests and strengthening our economy.

History of the program

The search for Canada's clusters started in May 2017 as part of the Innovation and Skills Plan introduced in the Government of Canada's "Building a Strong Middle Class" budget. Through Budget 2017, up to $950 million was committed over five years to support five independent, not-for-profit-led innovation clusters with the highest potential to accelerate economic growth.

The Global Innovation Clusters program, formerly known as the Innovation Superclusters Initiative, was launched through a two-phase competitive process.

The successful clusters were announced on February 15, 2018:

The clusters were chosen based on:

• their expected benefits to Canada, including economic impact and commercial results;
• how well they help position Canada for global leadership; and,
• their plans to generate new IP that could benefit Canada's economic development.

As part of Budget 2022, an additional $750 million over five years was earmarked for the Global Innovation Clusters to continue to strengthen their ecosystems and position Canada for global markets.

In 2022, the clusters were also allocated $125 million from the second phase of the Pan-Canadian AI Strategy to accelerate the commercialization and adoption of AI technologies. 

In 2023, through the National Quantum Strategy Commercialization Pillar, the Advanced Manufacturing Cluster and Digital Technology Cluster received $14 million to accelerate the growth of quantum technologies into impactful commercial innovations through collaborative large-scale projects.

As part of Budget 2024, Canada’s Advanced Manufacturing Cluster was allocated $50 million over two years to help scale up, commercialize, and promote the adoption of innovative housing technologies and materials in Canada’s homebuilding industry. 

These investments demonstrate the significant capacity and adaptability of the clusters and how they can be leveraged as key economic tools to support national priorities while delivering tangible results for Canadians.